Big
by cailin na gealai
Summary: Lauren suffers from a chronic condition that causes her weight gain. The story of her life with PCOS. A little bit of Puck/Lauren thrown in at the end.


**Title: Big**

**Summary: Lauren suffers from a chronic condition that causes her weight gain. The story of her life with PCOS. A little bit of Puck/Lauren thrown in at the end!  
**

**Rating: K+**

**Pairings: mild Pizes (Lauren/Puck)**

**Words: 1,097**

**Note: This is maybe a little sort of not canon, cuz I think Lauren mentioned something about the "Zizes thyroid" at one point. Ah well.  
**

* * *

You always had an inkling.

When you were three, you wondered why there was so much of you. You didn't know the word _fat. _Not yet.

When you were four, you lost your first beauty pageant. The girl who won was so much smaller than you. She sneered at you as she left the stage. As you walk to the car, crying, your mommy tells you "_honey, they were looking for a specific body type..."_

When you were six, you decided one day you would stop eating. You can't remember why. It doesn't matter now; you skipped one meal and decided it was too hard.

* * *

When you are seven-nearly-eight, your mother begins to realize something is Wrong.

Puberty has hit you hard; you have to wear a bra now, and your hips are suddenly wider than the rest of you. You've gained weight. Mother says, _"that's normal, that's normal"_ but she looks so worried when she says it.

You have been eight for only a week when you are put on your first diet. You still don't really know you are fat, you're just _big._ Your mother says no sugar and you are a good child so you don't eat your Halloween candy that year even though you want to.

It doesn't help. Your ninth birthday cake is a sugarless angel food cake with fresh strawberries on top; it tastes like air. The pictures of the cake are in direct counterpoint to the _rapidly expanding_ girl in the pictures. You have gained thirty pounds in your eighth year of life.

It is when you are nine that you realize you are fat. You remember the day so very clearly; you were starting ballet, again, for the first time in years. You stand there, looking at yourself in the mirror of the dance studio, realizing for the first time that you are _so much bigger_ than the rest of them. You cry, after class, and you never go back.

* * *

Your mother doesn't have to put you on a diet this time. You are ten years old and one hundred and thirty pounds. You share diets for a while. You start at eighteen hundred calories per day, but you still gain weight at a shocking rate. Fifteen hundred keeps your weight stable, for about six months when you are eleven. As your weight keeps slipping up and up and up, your caloric intake goes down.

You're almost twelve when you get your first period. You think _okay, I can deal with this, _but then it doesn't stop. Your period lasts six weeks and then you don't get another one for six months.

You are twelve years old. You eat one thousand calories per day. You exercise every morning before school. You are two hundred and twenty pounds.

* * *

By that point, your mother knows something is Very, Very Wrong. She takes you to your pediatrician; he says _"I can give you brochures for fat camp, if you'd like"._ Your mother takes you to doctors, and they all say the same thing; _"She must be eating too much and not exercising enough."_

That is the summer your grandfather stands over the pool's ladder and won't let you out until you swim _"just a few more laps._"

It's your thirteenth birthday when your mother takes you to an endocrinologist.

_"we see this all the time,_" she says.

Polycystic ovarian syndrome.

The rest of the words rush by, with _diabetes, no cure, diet, exercise, _fading to the back as the doctor tells you that you will Never Lose Weight.

* * *

You start high school a year later. You have no niche, and precious few friends; you've established yourself as headstrong and brutally honest. You have no group or place to be. You don't eat at school, so you spend lunch break in the library instead of the cafeteria. No one makes fun of you to your face, but you quickly learn whispers hurt twice as much.

You're not sure what club would take you. You feel horrifically out of place all the time, and you don't know what to do about it. You end up spending freshman year in a sort of daze, with few friends and few tormentors.

Sophomore year is a fresh start. You take your endocrinologist's advice to start playing sports, yet after one volleyball practice you know it's not for you. The boys' wrestling practice across the gym catches your eye, and you watch them for a while.

It takes many meetings and a lot of yelling, but six weeks later you are on the wrestling team. It is where you need to be. It's the only place where your weight is your advantage.

And, oh goodness, it is heaven.

* * *

Maybe it's the confidence you never had. Maybe hitting people just makes you feel good. It doesn't matter why it works, but wrestling _helps_ with the awful self-hatred that takes you over sometimes. The whispers aren't behind your back anymore; you know they still happen but you can't hear them any more. Maybe now you are happy.

You join Coach Sylvester's Old Maids Club. No reason why not. You'll be alone forever anyway. You injured the one boy you liked in a wrestling match. It's fine. You can punch anyone who gets in your way. Your way to what, you don't really know.

* * *

Glee club kids are dorks. You know that. Yet when you open the door to that locked Porta-Potty, you don't slam it back shut. Puck is in there. You like Puck. You don't know why.

When you help him out, you ask for two things. Seven minutes in heaven with him, and a box of Cadbury eggs. Your mom won't buy them for you anymore.

You aren't alone anymore after that, not for a while. You're mean to Puck, but you're afraid of the day when he'll realize what he is doing and dump her. That's why you don't accept his offers of a date. Not until he gets down on one knee with that stupid Ring Pop and asks you nicely.

It almost made up for him singing _Fat Bottomed Girls_ to you in class.

You don't show up for the date. You think about it; you're halfway to your car before you remember that he's probably stood you up. He forgives you though, your Mohawk man. He's not that kind of guy. Maybe he's just as alone as you are.

Maybe you both act like badasses to cover for yourselves. Maybe you and Puckerman are just alike on the inside. Maybe.

A girl can dream.

* * *

**A/N: Okay, this was hard to write. Minus beauty pageants and Puck at the end, this is me. Completely me. Ugh. My body image/self esteem are still shot to hell after a childhood counting calories.**

**Polycystic Ovarian Syndrome (PCOS ) is real. I did not make it up. It's specific to females and it's estimated that one in ten women have it. The symptoms are acne, unexplained weight gain/inability to lose weight, weird feminine things, and facial hair growth. This is an actual medical condition. If you feel you have these symptoms, see your doctor. Specifically, an endocrinologist. Untreated, it can lead to diabetes. More questions? PM me. PSA moment over.**

**As with all my stories, I do ask that if you choose to put this story on your Favorites list, that you would take a moment to leave me a review. Thank you!  
**


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